


Another Life

by maebyrutherford (maeberutherford)



Category: Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: F/M, Jealousy, Male-Female Friendship, Pining, Unrequited Crush, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-28
Updated: 2016-08-28
Packaged: 2018-08-11 14:16:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7895842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maeberutherford/pseuds/maebyrutherford
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alistair longs for a taken Warden.</p><p>(notice a pattern in my works lately? *sweats*)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Another Life

The air around them alights with her laughter, and for the moment, he’s on top of the world.

He’s come to know exactly how to amuse her - the right turn of phrase, a scathing takedown of someone they both dislike, a funny face - and it almost feels like he’s a musician and she’s the instrument, coaxing out those gorgeous sounds using his wit and words. That he can do so with relative ease is one of the few things he’s proud of.

She leans against him, like she always does when she grows sleepy from a belly full of food and laughter, and he inhales quietly. He has no idea what the light scent actually _is_ , but it’s ever present in her mass of curly hair. Tonight it’s mixed in with a bit of sweat from the day’s long walk in the sun, since none of the party had a chance to bathe.

“Oh, Alistair,” she sighs, staring into the fire. “How did you get to be so damn funny?”

She’s asked him this before. “Oh, haven’t I told you? I wasn’t really training to be a templar, it was a chantry school for jesters. I’m a little rusty, so I practice on you.”

He gets a mild giggle out of her; it’s not his best joke. “That’s a new one.”

“I try to keep you on your toes.” He’s very aware of the weight of her on his shoulder.

They fall silent, and the moment he’s been dreading - the thing that happens every single night and doesn’t ever seem to get easier - approaches. He wants to postpone it, to stop it. They haven’t had enough time, there’s never enough.

“Did you notice that boy in the rear of the caravan we passed today?” Alistair asks.

He can feel her furrow her brow. “Who? The blonde one?”

“Yes. Did you see the teeth on that kid?” He whistles softly. “Those have got to be the largest two front teeth I’ve ever seen, on any _human_ , anyway. He could probably bite through a tree branch with those things. Poor lad.”

She pushes away from him and swats him on the arm, and not very gently.

“Ow!”

“That is so mean - making fun of a child? You should be ashamed of yourself!” Her voice scolds but he recognizes the mirth in her eyes, glittering black in the low light of the dying fire.

“First of all,” Alistair huffs, “he wasn’t exactly a child - more like a teenager. And second of all, I’ll have you know that he stuck his tongue out at me and made a _very_ adult gesture when nobody was looking. He’s not exactly innocent.”

She shakes her head at him. “Do you hear yourself? Are you telling me your feelings were hurt by a _child_ , so you make fun of his looks in return?”

He shifts his bottom on the ground. “Well, when you put it like _that_ … ”

She chuckles wearily. “You know what I think? That it’s time for sleep.” She leans over and quickly kisses him on the temple - he reminds himself for the thousandth time that it means nothing, she does it to everyone in the party - and gets on her feet.

“Good night, Alistair.”

“Good night. Sweet dreams.” He smirks; it’s the ultimate Grey Warden in-joke.

“Ha ha, very funny,” she calls over her shoulder.

This is the moment he dreads every night, when she disappears inside her tent, where Zevran is undoubtedly waiting for her.

Every night at camp is the same. They set up, they dine, they sit by the fire, and one by one the party members turn in until it’s just Alistair and the woman of his dreams left chattering away. He tries to prolong the time with her - it’s so precious and fleeting - as much as he can. Oddly Zevran is usually the one who leaves them alone with a quip about getting his beauty sleep. Perhaps Alistair poses such little threat to the elf that he doesn’t care how much time the warrior spends with his lover. Or maybe it’s just the Antivan way, feeling very little jealousy or posessiveness, even willing to share their partners with others.

Alistair could never share her in that way.

So he sits and thinks of her smile, her words, her light and playful touches, and begs the silence to continue. From a distance he hears a light snore; probably Sandal. He ponders, not for the first time, whether or not it’s wise to nurture the friendship. But the alternative seems so much worse - giving her the cold shoulder, maintaining a professional relationship only, and never making her laugh? It’s unthinkable.

So he enjoys her as much as he can, and suffers sweetly. Most of the time things aren’t too terrible in that regard. During the day he can almost pretend that she’s unattached as they go about their business, traveling and battling foes. Even Zevran’s flirtations are easy to ignore, especially since she (blessedly) isn’t one for public displays of affection. It’s the nights at camp that are the hardest, punctuated by the fact that it’s the only time he gets to have her all to himself.

He didn’t intend on things turning out this way. It was clear early on that she had feelings for the elf and not for him. But the heart wants what it wants, as the ever observant Wynne likes to remind him. He’ll be strong, he’ll endure it, because having her in his life in this way is better than not having her in it at all.

He leaps forward in time to when this is all over, when the arch demon is vanquished and Thedas is saved from the blight. It’s highly likely they’ll be forced to go their separate ways - she with Zevran by her side, he alone (maybe as King, even though the thought fills him with terror). And what then? He imagines they’ll exhange letters faithfully for a while, and then the time between her responses will stretch longer and longer, until the letters cease altogether. She will undoubtedly be happy, in love, worshipped, preoccupied, and Alistair will become a distant memory, an anecdote, a friend she knew once during the fabled Fifth Blight. And she’ll never know how he truly feels, that his entire world revolves around her, and she could never become an afterthought in his life.

A soft, breathy moan interrupts his thoughts, and he swiftly rises and crawls inside his tent. Another moan, a man’s voice, and Alistair talks to himself to drown it out.

“Where are those bloody things? C’mon, where did I put you? C’mon, c’mon…”

He hums and rummages through his sack until his fingers grasp soft little bundles of dry moss. Just as he catches a snippet of another sound he doesn’t want to think about, he jams the moss in his ears, and is greeted with blissful silence.

 _She’s still worth it_ , he thinks as he settles onto his bedroll, but not without wondering if he might be losing his mind. All it will take is one smile from her in the morning for that thought to be forgotten.


End file.
